Former President Jose Napoleon Duarte is...

NO MORE MEDICINE.

September 22, 1989

- SAN SALVADOR — NO MORE MEDICINE. Former President Jose Napoleon Duarte is refusing medication for his liver cancer, his doctor said Thursday. ''We're trying to make his death painless,'' Dr. Jose Luis Saca. ''He asked that I not give him more medicine, so that he may die in peace.'' The former president's condition worsened Tuesday while he was attending a meeting in Guatemala. He is having great difficulty breathing because of lung congestion, Saca said. Duarte, 63, was the staunchest U.S. ally in the Western Hemisphere in the five years he was in power. In June, he was succeeded by Alfredo Cristiani, of the rightist Republican Nationalist Alliance.